{"id":231454,"date":"2026-04-14T16:44:05","date_gmt":"2026-04-14T16:44:05","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/231454\/"},"modified":"2026-04-14T16:44:05","modified_gmt":"2026-04-14T16:44:05","slug":"part-2-the-crows-nest","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/231454\/","title":{"rendered":"Part 2\u00a0 \u2013 The Crow’s Nest"},"content":{"rendered":"

\u201cIn college, I feel like that\u2019s a huge thing that you should be able to do is just really get involved and understand what you believe and also understand other perspectives and viewpoints and be able to hear that out,\u201d\u00a0junior criminology and political science major and president of TPUSA, Katie Gonzales told\u00a0The Crow\u2019s Nest.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Photo Courtesy of Gabriel Ballester-Rivera\u00a0<\/p>\n

By Jasmin Parrado and Julia Birdsall\u00a0<\/p>\n

On April 6, The University of South Florida St. Petersburg\u2019s Turning Point USA chapter and College Democrats hosted their second Left vs. Right Debate at the University Student Center ballrooms.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Students from the crowd had an opportunity to stand at the podium and speak their mind about a plethora of topics that pertained to current events in the United States.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

Debaters spoke on seven topics, including the actions and policies surrounding Immigrations and Customs Enforcement, U.S. involvement in international conflicts and universal healthcare.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The event lasted a total of three hours, but many students were still ready for more, as they expressed a desire to\u00a0participate\u00a0in future iterations of the event.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Junior criminology and political science major and president of TPUSA, Katie Gonzales, said that she is hopeful there will be another debate next semester.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"\"Animal biology senior and vice president of TPUSA, Marissa Smith, told\u00a0The Crow\u2019s Nest\u00a0that the second debate was organized \u201cto continue to create dialogue between both sides and bring people together.\u201d Photo Courtesy of Gabriel Ballester-Rivera\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"\"\u201cI think it\u2019s so important because you never know how your neighbor might be feeling, and that shouldn\u2019t shut you off,\u201d Annunziata told\u00a0The Crow\u2019s Nest. \u201cThat shouldn\u2019t keep you from having these important conversations, especially in hard times.\u201d Photo Courtesy of Gabriel Ballester-Rivera\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"\"Charles Wain-Nye, senior in digital communications, took his laptop to the podium\u00a0numerous\u00a0times to fact-check speakers throughout the three-hour debate, sparking cheers from the crowd.\u00a0Photo Courtesy of Gabriel Ballester-Rivera\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"\"Some debaters used facts and statistics, while others used\u00a0personal experiences\u00a0and feelings.\u00a0\u00a0Photo Courtesy of Gabriel Ballester-Rivera.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"\"Other topics included the government\u2019s role in the economy, the United States\u2019 mass deportation policies, the Second Amendment and whether the government has too much control over the media.\u00a0Photo Courtesy of Gabriel Ballester-Rivera\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"\"Though students expressed that they appreciate the outlet that events like the debate provide, those that spoke to\u00a0The Crow\u2019s Nest\u00a0remained steadfast in their views. \u201cThere\u2019s nothing so powerful as a made-up mind,\u201d said psychology and history\u00a0freshman\u00a0Petra\u00a0Bedenbaugh.\u00a0\u201cI feel like many people come here with their minds made up.\u201d\u00a0Photo Courtesy of Gabriel Ballester-Rivera.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"\"Senior political science major Izabella Annunziata said she appreciated how there was less booing and heckling from audience members at this debate compared to last semester, when the inaugural debate kicked off with a packed audience.\u00a0\u00a0Photo Courtesy of Gabriel Ballester-Rivera\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n


\n\t\t\t\t Post Views: 71 \n\t\t\t<\/p>\n

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Written by: Jasmin Parrado<\/a> on April 14, 2026.
Last revised by: Julia Ferrara<\/a> <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\u201cIn college, I feel like that\u2019s a huge thing that you should be able to do is just…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":231455,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[202,204,203,199,201,200],"class_list":["post-231454","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-st-petersburg","tag-st-pete","tag-st-pete-headlines","tag-st-pete-news","tag-st-petersburg","tag-st-petersburg-headlines","tag-st-petersburg-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/231454","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=231454"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/231454\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/231455"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=231454"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=231454"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=231454"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}